King Charles III once dated Princess Diana’s sister, whom he later married.

The then Prince Charles was married to Diana Spencer, Lady Di, between 1981 and 1996. Princess Diana, who died in a car accident in 1997, was one of the most influential figures in the English monarchy.

But, before this marriage, the heart of today’s King Charles –who will be officially crowned this Saturday (6th)– belonged to Lady Sarah, Diana’s older sister.

Elizabeth Sarah Lavinia Spencer, today Sarah McCorquodale, was born in 1955 in the United Kingdom, being the eldest of four siblings.

At the age of 28, Charles approached the then 22-year-old Sarah during an annual horse racing event in the summer of 1977. Lady Di was only 16 at the time.

The Spencer family has been part of the British aristocracy for hundreds of years, with Diana and Sarah’s grandmothers serving as ladies-in-waiting, personal assistants to Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother – when her daughter, Queen Elizabeth II, who died in 2022, still was a princess.

Sarah began attending royal family events and forming a connection with Charles, which would result in a brief relationship.

Newspapers at the time promoted strong expectations about who would be Charles’s official suitor. The Prince of Wales’ every move was monitored by the royal family and the media, a dynamic that generated a bit of a stir every time he showed signs that he was seeing someone.

“Time” magazine published in 1977: “Lady Sarah Spencer, slender, red-haired, 23 years old, spent a skiing holiday with Charles and other friends last winter in a Swiss chalet. She, however, insists that they are just friends.”

The courtship of the two, however, did not last for long.

The troubled end of the relationship

The relationship between Lady Sarah and the Prince of Wales began to fall apart in early 1978, when Sarah traveled to Switzerland with the current King and entrusted an interview to journalists James Whitaker and Nigel Nelson.

According to journalists, Sarah spoke about her adventures with alcohol during adolescence, her expulsion from school and her problem with anorexia. She also reportedly spoke about what she thought about her relationship with the then prince.

Writer Tina Brown, author of the bestseller “The Diana Chronicles”, wrote that Sarah realized her mistake “as soon as the words were out of her mouth”.

“She made things worse by trying some damage control by suggesting that Whitaker’s interview had been obtained through dirty means. It didn’t work out well,” the author wrote.

Whitaker, in response to Sarah’s accusations, published in Woman’s Own magazine, under a pseudonym, controversial lines that would have been said during the interview.

Prince Charles is a romantic who falls in love easily. But I can assure you that if there was any engagement between Prince Charles and me, it would have happened by now. I’m a hurricane lady, not a long, slow courtship person. Our relationship is completely platonic.

“I wouldn’t marry anyone I didn’t love, be it the dustman or the King of England. If he [Charles] asked me to marry him, I would refuse.”

Alerted that her citations would be published in the magazine, Sarah would have approached Charles to warn him personally about what was to come.

“You’ve just done something extremely stupid,” Charles reportedly said. The incident marked the end of their relationship.

In 1980, Lady Sarah Spencer married farmer and former British Army officer Neil Edmund McCorquodale, with whom she has three children and currently lives.

Although she has sought to stay out of the media context in recent years, Sarah has returned to the spotlight after the release of The Crown, on Netflix.

Sarah, the “cupid” of Charles and Diana

Diana, then 16, met Charles at a party in 1977 at the Spencer home in Althorp, England, when her sister Sarah was still dating the then Prince of Wales.

In an interview with “The Guardian” in 1981, Charles highlighted “how much fun” Lady Di was. In the article, Sarah brags: “I introduced them. I’m Cupid.”

Years after Sarah’s breakup with the prince, in 1980, Charles and Diana, then aged 32 and 19, respectively, met and started dating.

Photographed by paparazzi in Balmoral, one of the British royal family’s residences, the rumors of a new relationship for the prince were confirmed.

Princess Diana lived in London and worked mainly as a dance teacher.

Breaking standards, Lady Di was the first English woman to marry the heir to the British throne in 300 years and also stood out for having a job.

Princess Diana’s relationship with Charles was troubled, with accusations of treason on his part.

In August 1996, the couple formally divorced.

In 1997, Diana’s car crashed into a wall on the Ponte de l’Alma in France, killing the princess, her boyfriend, Dodi Al-Fayed, and driver Henri Paul.

Lady Sarah McCorquodale presided over the Diana Memorial Fund, which raised more than R$690 million for various charities in its 15 years of existence, until its closure in 2012.